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User blog:Chronias/Velia LeQuella (Requiem)
'Velia LeQuella '''was a renowned Kindred occultist and telepath, an elder of the Mekhet clan's Alucinor bloodline. What could be perceived: Kine Velia bothered little to make up mortal alteregos of herself after she received the Embrace - playing usually herself while being shrouded in and cushioned by considerable a considerable amount of uncertainty obscured and ommitted by figmented suggestions of familiarity. She however understood that a managable facade must be offered for public observation and parlance thus she usually names herself as either either her own biological or adopted daugher -officailly by one ghoul or another- or at least inheritor and then officially changes surname to Le'Quelly "out of tradition". In the laest nighgts she was called Volante Le'Quella, living with her family in a villa in the North Italian town of Gorizia who most likely had French or Swiss Romandian ancestry. She wound up in some of the galas in town too, acoompanied by a man named Lior Margulies. She also seemed to have some ties to the local noble family's descendants who run either a hotel or a foundation in the city. She is said to be a sleep therapist by trade, and her compainon being involved with coaching. Volante claimed to have medical cerificate from the University of Geneva. She indeed may have been also known for traveling to Switzerland and to France now and then - deliberately by car. She had a pretty novel Ford Flex, but she was never seen driving it herself. Kindred She is usually known as Velia, regardless of whatever official name she carries. Depending on who you ask she is know many different ways in extent and reaon. Most Kindred who heard of her could tell you she is old blood, an elder. Mekhet among these will surely know she is one of them. Those who heard or her and claim to know her will surely tell that she is an occultist, an Auspex master, one of the Sandmen, a telepath, a Dragon, a mysticist, a theosophist, a suspect of herecy, an accomplice of mages, a secret broker, a lackadisical pretender... - again, depending on the person. If you would ask around at the Courts of Verona, -Geneva, or -Nantes, you will be told she might be in any of these cities, or possibly point to even her main haven's location in the town of Gorizia in Northern Italy. If you ask around in one of the major comsopolite cities on the globe, you would be rather turned to Olivie Deveraux, who claims to be her childe, which will possibly puzzle you with her air of an artsy Daeva. Kindred in her localitis will say, she rarely leaves her haven(s), possibly not even for a hunt, but when she does she is accompanied by her ghouls, seemingly always, if not playing bodyguards, companions then at least one will trail her in the shadows. Mekhet may confirm that some of her companions are indeed bodyguards, and not just ghouls but would mention any random walk of shady Mekhet, most likely Khaibit. Some would imply she has ties to the Ordo Dracul, some may even suggest that being a serious one. What was less known: As she received the embrace Velia soon showed the characteristics of the 'Sandmen' who sail on the winds and swim on the streams of dreams and also can influence them. In due course her mental abilities advanced and seasoned to made her a sort of augur and a powerful telepath - in effect turning her in to a silent information broker and counselor to hidden designs of plots that usually take decades or centuries to earn fruition. In her most practical dealings she made an unliving by selling intiguing information, apalling or inciminating secrets to those who show a measurable interest for such. She was both well respected or shunned or seen in awe for these talents - dependeding on the view of party who either benfitted from or was ashamed by her disclosure. Velia differed form her fellow Damned in that she possessed a high degree of humanity and spiritual serenity, and later as an elder becoming advanced in certain abilities and possessing the right perks she overcame the signature Mekhet weakness of aggravated light sensitivity. Furhermore though a series of enlightening torpor experiences she became able to tap mystical powers not inherent to vampires. She had a mystical connection to stars or more precisely starlight, claiming that these celestial bodies are ''"aetherial beacons that nourish those who know how to trans-act with them". This idea was quite esoteric, or say novel, to the Ordo Dracul even, but were seen as one with potential, especially as she cuold also realate even this to trace Ley Line flows and identify much prized Wyrm's Nests. Velia too developed a technique of anaesthetic 'mental healing' through phychosomatic influence during dreaming to be used for the benefit of both Kine and Kindred. A These marketable powers earned her a favorable standing with the Invictus - through the Courts of Verona, Geneva and Nantes). She too striked the interest of the Lancea et Sanctum with her health restoring mental willwork many times. They were of double mind concerning her being either as angelic as it may seem apparent or rather demonic in true nature. Biography _______________________________ Early life - 15th Century Velia was born to a Friuli noble lady (who in turn was the daughter of the last Holy-Roman count of Görz, Leonhard, and his second wife - a daugther of Francesco I. Gonzaga of Mantua, Italy, who died in childbirth), Veronica Etheling Meinhardiner von Görz and to the son of a French military officer hailing from the Loire-valley county of Anjou, Alain LeQuella. Her first name is an Italian version of the ancient roman family name Velius, meaning concelaed. She was raised by her mother who was largely denied of any possible inheritance for being a lower renking female scion of her lineage, and because of later she disgracefully gave birth to a sole illegitimate daughter (Velia) sired by one of the invading French army's lowly commoner soldier to whom she of course did not and could not marry. Velia's father remained enlisted by the French army and he subsequently died on the battlefield in one skirmish of the Italian Wars. For decades her mother maintained an infirmary in their house to provide medical aid and shelter for the injured where Velia was helping to tend to the wounded and the infirm. One day a stranger showed up on their doorsteps to offer help in exchange for lodging for a time. Velia's mother had second thoughts but accepted the man in as his help was much needed both as a healer and as someone who would protect them too from possible less kind strangers, as much as the mother and daughter family did rely on one or more man's or servant's helping hands around the household. He turned out to be an exceptional healer, a miracleworker even and Velia learned much next to him concerning medicine. Much to her fascination the man was quite the company to listen to Velia's fancies and dreams and even interpret them, which dreams and thought she didn't feel confortable sharing even with her mother. In 1500 Velia's maternal grandfather died without a (legitimate) heir and his title and domain was integrated in to that of inner-Austrian Achdukes'. Velia and her mother had to abandon their original home eventually due to financial concerns and due to the fact that not even the remainders of original class could provide them any aid in the everyday stuggles. Her mother moved to Venice where she made a living as an apothecary cleck, then finally moved to Insbruck to seek refuge and live there with her Swabic and Austrian relatives of her fathers' line. Renaissance and 16-18th Centuries Velia did not remain with her Mother in Austria. She decided to look for the man she learned so much of medicine and philosophy from. She wished to become better skilled and more educated in both. However it seemed as a chance meeting, later Velia realized it was not - they met at the University of Geneva. There Velia used her small allowance to attend the realtively newly founded university and though it was basically a theologial seminar and law school for only men to attend, she utilized her resources as paying young men to bring her in to tutoring sessions as their 'sister'. Doing so she learned phylosophy and some of medicine. All the while she tried to cover her expenses by doing menial work for the Universit's Dormitory. Once her money was not enough to buy the willingness of the the students to bring her in to the lectures she inadverently had the sole option to buy favor for some other favor that usually involved physical ministration for lustful needs. It was around those nights in Geneva that she was found abused and almost lethally wasted by the already familar man who did embrace her seeing more potential in her unlife as much less in her life. Her sire, after his masquerade alias was known as Leonardo de Candia, a hermeticits who was also at a time an agent of the Folorentine Medici family in Pistoia, Tuscany. He made her aware of the arcane teaching of the Hermetics, and too introduced her to the art of Insomnium starting with shared dreams but took more extensive care to train Velia to master Auspex as an impotant means of survival and he finally introduced her to the Ordo Dracul. Velia came to understand he was a wise man, leading her throuh her fledgeling neonate time with much compassion reflecting to his own experiences through anecdotic recalling. He taught her that being vampire is generally a torment, and the embrace is a sin to trasmit one's curse to another in the false hope of thinking one can make differnce over the torment, the false concept of creating something of merit, to preserve something of virtue and worth. He however still belived that Velia was special, but in due course she, what she was started to become kept reminding him on his own shortcomings - as much as Alucinor sires and childer have a great potential seeing one another like that. Her sire eventually went on his own travels to continue his path on to "attaining Gnosis" - as he said, stepping out of her unlife in a similar fashion he did step in to her life at the start of their relationship. Velia went on to maintain the unlife of the 'Sandmen', but soon had to find out that simply swimming the currents of dreams in itself is less than enough to make an unliving. She contacted her mother in Insbruck first via dream, then in person. Veronica was shocked to see her daughter looking pale and sickly. The experience wasshocking to Velia herself, and perhaps this was a cause she learned after that visit the first two Coils of the Flesh in a rush after she sought sponsorship and mentorship in one of the first possible Academies of the Ordo Dracul, what was by the time a very new covenant of Kindred. Velia dived in to learning, searching and interpreting what scattered and most often incoplete notes existed of the Rites of the Dragon in tose chaotic times where both outside persecution and internal struggels blighted the Ordo. According to Veronica's diary Velia at least once spent a dinner with her mother (eating food - as it should be). Geneva - by the middle of the 16th century become a Protestant city and a state of welfare - definitely provided benefits fot he local Ordo chapter what other chapters across Europe hardly shared. During her studies Velia became aware that her mental powers did really extend over the course, surging up not just by walking the dreamstide but she eventually came to firmly control telekinetic powers and mind-related effects that she attributed to Auspex clearvoyance and telapathy she constantly refined from the moment of her embrace, and also was a chief factor of her relative fast advancement within the Ordo. She realized that some of the members of the Gonzaga family she is related to (by mortal means) through her maternal grandmother's line are actually Kindred, based in the Kingdom of Napoli, she however did little to nothing to gain any benefit from the fact of the connection. Victorian Era With the rise of the Ordo in numbers and prominece in the 19th century - on the other hand it almost entirely was withdrawn from Kindred society by the beginning of Queen Victoria's reign. While most Ordo members utilized this era of sercret society life to infiltrate and learn from other esoteric Kindred covenats as Theban Sorcery of the Lancea Sanctum or the Crúac of the Circle of the Crone, Velia turned her attention elsewhere - from Kindred society to that of mages. During these decandes did Velia enter a more extended torpor, which was by design ritually prepared by fellow Mekhet Agonistes Kindred to aid her, for what she made arrangements in advance. While torpid, she was able to jorney - what she later learned from charmed and even ghouled mages while clandestine meetings and private researches were - Astral Space. Her inherent connection to the mortal's Dreamsape technically allowed her entry to the Oneiroi of people. Another set of astral journeys and further arcane knowlege attained - by forcefully infiltrating mage cabals like the Reality Makers for one example - made her aware of the Aether as well. Velia used Insomnium to a great deal to manifest in the Oneiroi of mages thus sparked initial interest, usually followed by manipulations of Majesty and Obsfuscate and even through Vinculum that could finnaly even set up Velia being perceived as a mage with actual Nimus of her own. Through the study of Aether and through research with the cooperation of mages and sharpening her already impressive Auspex disciplin even further Velia found even herself - to a degree - counscious of arcane resonances and actively took on researching the 'Nexus' es or 'Wyrm's Nests' the Ordo Dracul always had in great regard. She too did understand that a vampire has no hopes for Awakening as some Kine may be to become an actual mage. Vampiric soul is severly altered during the Embrace and cannot be harmonized with the Supernal Realms anymore, moreover a mage turned in to vampire immediately loses therir ability to cast spells, as ther Avatar is destroyed upon the Embrace and - in a sense -is replaced by the powers conferred with the entanglement of the vampire's inner Beast. Perhaps one of her most valuable revelations after that understandig was, that however denied fom attaining the spark of divinity from within alone - without certain aid -, the endeavour to do so might be catalyzed by harnessing ambient aetherial power to calm ones (vampiric) soul to open up for the Suprenal. She started reasearch on the nature and the power of starlight, and came to realise that starlight bears a sublime aetherial harmonic resonance free from the ardent elemental force of the Sun. She designed a number of Vitae-infused light "well"''s in her or in some cases in some of her client's Havens that absorb starlight and in an almost religious way offers some of such captured arcane light back to the night sky. It was during these same nights that she developed her anaesthetic and holistic mental healing abilities after feeding on vials of extracted Vitae imbued in one of her starlit wells. She discovered that by consuming vials of Vitae imbued as such augments her Insomnium abilities in the way she can restore mental and psychosomatic maladies in her targets of effect and perhaps most importantly also becoming able to ease the healing process of aggravated damages in Kindred by conferring meditative, say blissful dream and actual sleeping. The vials she usually took to the Lancea et Sanctum or invited a priest of the Spear to preserve them via Theban Sorcery, however this became halfway obsolete after Kine invented the process to refrigerate blood. The vials act as repsitory of the mystical power filtered down from the Materia Prima - allowing Velia expand the limits of Insomnium and Auspex to manipulate other's self-sense and even metabolic over-control through ''"Psychic chirurgery", a Devotion of her own invetion. This ability of hers became even more sought after by Kindred clients than digging up someone's dirt from dreams and slumber. Her frivolous status as a vamipre occultist in close relation with mages stirred much unrest, outrage and perhaps even more curiosity among the ranks of the Dragons, but eventually it was tolerated in order to finally provide some insight on the arcane knowlege of Kine mages that was obcure to the Ordo. However Velia had a 'skewed' ''perspective of experiencing Magic, for most if not all her acquired arcane powers were in line with and only furthering of her Auspex powers and - most interestingly to the Dragons - with the Coil of the Ascendant. Regarding her experiments with the magic of starlight stoke the attention of even a mage cabal, the Eyes of Ain Soph, who sought her out and provided counsel in exchange of participation in the experiments. Velia could not keep this in secret from the Ordo, who as a whole did not actually object having her a cooperation with mages who then offered to consider Velia as a vampire occultists contact for the Mysterium. Velia had to swear a Great Oath to the Ordo Dracul though, one of unwavering loyality and as such she became a Sworn of the Dying Light. She became a central character among the 'Angelics' or 'Nephilim' camp of the Ordo Dracul - Dragons, who believed that transcendence is in omniscience and by supposedly becoming something of a ''"beatific" creature, overcoming the monstrous one Kindred are. The naming of the camp has to do a great deal with the entities of the Aether, called Angels. Velia was impressed to learn that mages can summon Suprenal entities, including Anges, as was she shocked to learn that they can summon Seraphim, whom are Forces (like burning light) manifested and thus could only meet with Rötschreck from her part - however she was not just accepting to observe but even insisting for summons of Cherubim, the recondite entities of Prime, who are nut just a fount of Mana but also that of considerable knowlege and divine inspiration. The name 'Nephilim' comes from the Hebrew "נְפִילִים" ~ "nephíl" and for the Ordo camp is understood is a reference to both the notion that they are childer in between heaven and earth and that they are the Damned 'Angelics' of what the Awakened call the Fallen World - i.e. 'fallen angels'. Velia was taught a great deal of the nature of the Prime and its relation to all megic by summoned Cherubim and she was endlessly fascinated by these celestials. According to her childe, Olivie, Velia adopted to display a third eye in the Dreamtime and sometimes though illusions even in the real world after beholding a Cherub decorated with many sets of beautiful eyes all over its body. The 19th Centuriy Playing out the Austrian restoration after Napoleons grasp and esuing era of peace and upheaval Velia acquired a manse in Cividale del Friuli near Udine - and to Gorizia where she used to grow up. Also during this era she developed the custom to effortlessly transport her household to another location, to either as close as Venice or someplace away as Geneva or as relatively far as Angers where she got hold on or "inherited" safe-houses as well, respectively. However as any Alucinor values their safety she often had the wanderlust to travel to these relatively far areas from time to time as a human might say needing a change of air or landscape, she too seemed to need some change of dreamscape occasionally. After a very powerful nightmare resulting in sleepwalking during daylight Velia suffered severe burns but was eventually picked up and dragged to the shadows by one of her ghouls (later childe, Lior Margulies) she seriously took on studying the Dragon Coil of Banes, but eventually settled with the even more focused Coil of the Ascendant. After Bram Stroker did in feect expose the secretive Ordo Dracul to Kindred Society and seeded interest in vampires in Kine popular culture, the Dragons had to abandon their reclusive nature and became a full fledged covenant of its own, a powerful one as well. Those who had double-allegiances from before the exposure became sacrafices of either covenant's ire while some of them became the firs Kogaions of the Order. 20th Century The great wars of this century brought unrest and stife to the Kine, and subseqently to Kindred as well by significantly thinning the source of sustenance. Velia saw wisdom to start studying the Coil of the Blood, and even started to utilize the Taste of Life, the second rung of the Coil of Flesh - what she did earlier only for show, in years of strife sometimes it was esier to take some food to quench the thirst to some degree as mortal cattle thinned and was also of "weak" blood. Velia Had to abandon her haven in Gorizia as the town became actually situated on the frontline of the First World War between Austria-Hungary and Italian forces and the battles at Isonzo happened in the close vicinity of it. It is needles to mention that the deaths of hundreds of thousend in the area spolied the 'Fontal Nest' which was the main reason she choose the site originally. She fleed to Venice, then passing through Verona shi moved permanently to Geneva - as Switzerland was independent country. She returned to Gorizia 1918 to reclaim her haven and spent much time and resources to cleanse the Fontal Nest by manipulating local Ley Lines and performing various rituals and to renovate and even re-build the mansion. This was the time when she honed her Geomantic skills to even a marketable level. Her capability to track Ley Line flows and indentifying 'Wellheads' and Wyrm's Nests and being a Dragon since almost the beginnings made her a prized member of the Ordo Dracul. The Second World War did not affect Friuli quite as much as the previous one, while on the other hand her Angers townhouse was impaired during the bombing of the city in 1947. Later Nights However she was generally detached from everynight politics and public unlife Velia's insights and telpathic intelligence gathering customs earned her a non-coveted place among the Invictus Court of Verona mostly due to the phychic healing enhancement treatments offered to some seated members of the faction and to the fact she could percieve mental patterns on a general level which were often suitable to be taken in connection with actual happenings. She became regarded as Senator after she geomantically arranged some areas in use by the Prince of Verona and those of some of his courtiers. This she duplicated these favors at the Court of Geneva and at the Court of Nantes as well, seadily establishing an honored status with the Domitors of her Havens localities. She maintained a grassroot network of telepathic and telempathic contacts and informants, widened through her childer, ghouls and associate Kindred. She did not use her informations up very much, and even more rare were those occasions when she would abused those, other than forwarding valuable intelligence and precious information she occasionally "phished" to a thankful buyer or bidder. Her aforementioned remedial powers being on potential offer made her wanted by some for such a service, and she was never barring herself from a lucrative deal and the chance to offer help where and when it was needed. She tended to deliberately making herself generally unaprochable on the other hand, adding an air of respect to her. This was gone often as far as she has woven obfuscated and unreal spaces in her haven, like seemingly endlessly repeating semi-uniformal rooms and furnishings of pure figment out of plain practical eccentricism, she would rather refer to as "Sancuary" and sudtified as "need for solitude". Velia a couple times needed to spend significant time in torpor in orded to thin her blood becoming too potent which woul allow her feeding only on Kindred. Usually she arranged Agonistes ritualists to assist her in overcoming the "memory skews". Later, as her own "astral insights" developed, she became less reliant on these mystic clansmen, but kept good relations with them nevertheless. Her last attempt of thinning her over-condensed Vitae however was a very uncommon if not outright apocryphal, yet successful method - guarded as jealously as vampiric occultism generally is. Appearance and Personality _______________________________ Velia had an overall pale complexion but could sometimes muster almost life-like but still very moderate rosy coloration on cheeks and around her cold golden gleaming eyes. (She often goes to invigorate at least her face and hands with the Blush of Life.) However she was often detached from the living and the what she called the "sleeping world" altogether, spending not excessive attention to follow the fahion of neither Kine nor even Kindred up to date, she was dressing in attires and gowns mostly after the tastes of mild late renaissance or classicist and prominently those of the empire/regency styles, and definitely it is something the average and, say conformist, human would have called "a little eccentric". People who claimed to remember her from their dreams of hallucinations often report that she bears a third eye on her forehead, strangely vertically aligned that glows with a soft pale golden radiance and is also describet to be weeping luminous volatile substance, what made it quite memorable at times. She was a resolute solitary person. She was fond of being alone and be left with her thoughts, and an ocean of subcounscious (of others) she found better filtering well -for sanity's sake-, meditating very often and she was devoting much time to reach and potentially even linger in what her sire called "Gnosis". She too was gone fom time-to-time in to voluntary torpor for undefined extents of time. In spite of her casual detachment from the world in general she did readily offer to help others in need and also was happy to sprinkle and seed wisdom to those who sought it or were prone to seek hers exactly. She felt it was her destiny to lead as much people -Kindred and Kine alike- on to the path of wisdom as possible, however she never dragged anyone on to it as she firmly believed that one has to ripen in soul enough to take the steps by his or her own wisdom and insight. She left her "ivory tower" at least once or twice a week to attend clients or paying customers of specific information or augury, other times troubled or hunted people seeking some remedy for psychic, psychosmatic, or physical banes. She always teded to adhere to the notion of the Masquerade, especially while performing health aid, always applying Blush of Life while seeing to Kine in pubilc and almost always resorting to put patients to sleep with a single anaesthetic touch during or before any form of treatment service she may have rendered. Velia maintained a relatively large number of ghouls through the 'bliss' of her Vitae. She could develop a stronger telepathic bond with her ghouls so she saw little harm in their creation and in their maintenance, also she utilizes some of these individuals as retainers and bodyguards. She did not intentionally seek power or control, only a comfortable and safe existence to bear her Requiem buying enough quality time for herself to attain "Gnosis". She believed that there was little to rule but much to teach in the world - so she was staying to attempt to do so. Not by forceful means as preaching or conversion, though, but by setting up the signs to attempt pointing to and at other's potential personal insights, much like a psychologist would try to incite revelations and make their patient's have their personal insights to be gained of themselves by themselves. She was more often than not obsessed with divination, regularly too prone to see signs wher they may or may not have been, ehich made her often observing the arrangement of cuttlery on surfaces, furniture in rooms etc, looking for hidden meanings and patterns. She however directly converted her later developed sensitivity for ley lines of geomantic power, of what she probably profited half as much as from mental therapies. She used to fuse Vitae in to her face and reveled farts of flesh often unintentionally when among Kine especially when she received surprise-attention. In retrospect Velia could deduct that her own aura did alternate between an emotional/devotional call and a scientific/intellectual aspration to attain a synchron with her existence and its place in the whole, realizing the true path is in their potential synthesis. Quasi-Nimbus As much as vampires are deprived of the hopes of ever Awakening as mages can, during much of her dealings and interactions with mages and even in some cases other Kine, or Kindred even Velia never did shun from projecting a definite mage-like Nimbus. Of course it was always always a cosmetic illusion conjured up from Majesty's Awe subtly blended with Obsfuscation (also called 'Chains of the Spirit' as a Devotion) - however it never failed to inspire, becalm or terrify onlookers. Childer _______________________________ The childer by modern nights found their temporary place in Kinderd society and needed not to be still under Velia's skirt, however she maintained an active and mutual mind-link with them. Sometimes they saw this as a restriction to their freedom, but they came to learn that it is a support as well. Her connection with her childer is uncharacteristic for the general Alucinor bloodline. They are somewhat in contrast with their sire, though, as they are not such isolationists but rather infiltrators and the most active eyes, ears and "mind- and dreamwitnesses" in her service. Alucinor seldom embraced more than one childe and also tended to estrange from the childe quite in a short time, as much as they did not like to spend much time among their bloodline members either - for again they reminded them on their own shortcomings. Velia was sort of an exception of the kind, having two childer created already. As independent as her childer were, she and them both knew well that they still had much to lean to follow their own right Paths. Olivie Devereaux imghttps://farm9.staticflickr.com/8665/15891629124_e3801dfb91_m.jpg[/img] The eldest childe of Velia, Olivie, however Alucinor and a "Ladder-climber" and Angelic Dragon too herself in every respect she publicly donned the guise of a high profile iternational fine arts curator with a zest sufficient to abash a Toreador Daeva. She profited greatly by the use of her trained Auspex abilities, first of all the Artist's Intent. She acted as a travelling "token" keeping sleepers wherever she was going under surveillance. She never missed to meddle at the Venice, Bushwick (NY), Paris, Liverpool, Moscow, Sidney, São Paulo, Singapore and Shanghai art biennales - social-butterflying Invictus Princes and Carthian Premiers all over the globe. Olivie was deliberately raised an unconventionally lively Alucinor childe. She was a wickedly manipulative, subtly scheming Mekhet "socialite" well trained to know what to say and how to react in any social circumstance, maintaining an unshakable presence. Having a relatively long and close bond with her sire, with permission Olivie could "borrow" some of Velia's mental powers through their telepathic bond, even remotely by the two of the simultaneously practicing Insomnium in synchron. Lior Margulies imghttps://farm9.staticflickr.com/8646/16514199555_6a3e136c2c_m.jpg[/img] Originally functioning for a long time as Velia's ghoul and bodyguard he eventually (after saving her unlife a couple times) became her second childe. Since his complete transformation Lior was not hiding the least that he too possessed the gifts of his sire and played his part in his Velia's endeavour to have her dreamstide expanded to both greater limits and depth. Lior was thus a monitor at large for especially the Invictus and the Carthian Movement, mirroring his older brood-mate's lifestile as a traveling information broker and coach. More often than his "sister", Lior was frequently in physical proximity to his Sire. Although by modern nights Lior too was sometimes distracted by his own lucid dreams and creeping nightmares potentially compromising his ability to "watch over" her, Velia still got comfort knowing he was within reach. She could however purge his eerie subconshious by taking his haunted-ness to face those unrealities herself, freeing him form those for substantially long extents of time by the use of her Psychic chirurgery, which resulted rendering Lior unable to use Insomnium disciplne entirely (which he didn't miss much in truth) - in turn Velia could however further benefit from Lior's 'sobriety' if she needed the reiable support of fomeone she really trusted. Haven(s) _______________________________ *Velia had a manse in the town of Gorizia in Northern Italy (34170, Via degli Orzoni, 45). Locally as she participates in the Masquerade she was regualrly known as a sleep therapist, or a line thereof. (Gorizia with the rest of Friuli region is under the administration of the Court of Verona in Italy.) *An apartment used by Olivie in Venice (30125, San Polo, 1176A). Venice is a Sangiovanni fiefdom issued by the Prince of Verona. *A townhouse in Geneva (1204, Rue de la Fontaine 11). Geneva is a Court capital for the Romandy region in Switzerland. *A townhouse in Angers (49100, 5 Place Michel Debré) she inherited by virtue as proving herself to be a straight line descendant of his grandfather. Angers in Pays-de-la-Loire region of France is governed by the Court of Nantes. During the centuries she mastered the means of building a transportable household with her few childer (or without them) and a small number of ghouls that can effortlessly move from one safe house to another. Kindred of course do not take airlines as a valid means of transportation (regarding possibly unpredictable transfer times, delays, less-then-calculable night flights, not to mention body heat checks), unless having access to a private plane. Velia in modern nights used to resort to travel by car, as she didn't usually risked a trip longer that 8 ours at a time. Before the age of publicly affordable private automotive travel, she resorted to night trains, and before theat very infrequent and lengthy night rides by carriage (interrupted by dayily shelterings, usually in the wardrobes or closets of inn rooms, while one of her ghoul compainion occupied the bed proper and another a second room, one of them being passed for a carriage driver.) Due to the Alucior week points in unlife she had to cultivate an almost deranged extent of personal security which is indeed welcomed in moments of unreal experiences, doors were locked and windows were curtained or otherwise shaded automatically, eralier trusted on to housekeeping ghouls but in modern days also aided by programmaing and smart solutions technology. Velia's personal quarters were not always easily accessible by conventional means. This means that she was inhabiting areas of her domiciles that are displaced by or indetectable through one's ordinary perception. She was inclined to think of those who can not make it to her were most likely not worthy for her presence. She had no fear of falling down these vertical corridors, for she ususally dreamt only of stumbling down stairs.. Obviously she laid no traps around any of her holdings, thinking it may be a she in distraction who would fall for such. Her Abodes not unlike thsose of the Alucinor by general had the preference for secure, secretive lairs where they can conduct their studies of psychology in seclusion. Her three eastablished Havens all had a "well" installed. (See Prime Infusion ''below) The Havens were located along but at least colse to the slowly shifting ley lines the Ordo Dracul was so profficet to map since millennia. It was on numerous occasions that "Wellheads" "Wyrm's Nests" manifested, and the Gorizia mansion was exactly placed where it stood being a location of recurring Fontal Nest. Abilities __________________________________________ Skills: Academics ****, Crafts *, Computer *, Investigation **, Medicine ***, Occult ****, Politics **, science *, Stealth **, Survival *, Empathy ****, Expression *, Persuasion ***, Socialize **, Subterfuge *, Wits***, . Disciplines: *Auspex ******* ::: Heightend Senses, An ear for Lies, Aura Perception, The Spirit's Touch, Telepathy, Twilight Projection, Genius Loci, Prediction, Spirit Bond, Telepathic Communication, The Dreaming, The Mind Revealed. *Celerity ** *Dominate ** ::: Command, Mesmerize. *Insomnium **** ::: Derams of the Many, Lucid Dreaming, Chain the Enslumbered Mind, Blissful Sleep. *Majesty **, ::: Awe, Revelation. *Obfuscate *** ::: Touch of Shadow, Mask of Tranquility, Cloak of Night *Resilience ** Coils of the Dragon: *Coil of the Ascendant ' ' ' ' ' conversible to Coil of Banes *** ::: Surmounting the Daysleep, The Warm Face, Conquer the Red Fear, Peace With the Flame, Sun's Forgotten Kiss. *Coil of Blood * ::: Blood Seeps Slowly *Coil of the Beast * ::: Chastise the Beast *Coil of Flesh * ::: The Man Wakes, A Taste of Life. *Coil of Slumbers * ::: Awakening the Beast Devotions: (Auspex: A, Celerity:C, Coil of the Dragon: CoD, Dominate: D, Insonmium: I, Majesty: M, Obsfuscate: O, Resilience: R) Chains of the Spirit (M+O), Eyes of the Dragon (A+CoD), Iron Facade (O+R), Knowing the Stranger (A+O), ''Psychic Chriurgery (A+I), Quicken Sight (A+C), Sleepwalker (D+I), Specter Sight (A+O), Talk of the Town (A+M), Touch of Deprivation (A+D), Veridical Tongue (A+M). Psychic Chirurgery: This unique ability Velia developed is the reult of focusing both the telepathich powers of Auspex and subcounscious-manipulating means of Insomnium in a way of sincracy so that it may allow to her to dive in to the mind of her subject and is able to remove mental loops like compulsions and charms, rearrange cognitive alignmets like derangements, with more cincetration she is able to mend mental disjuctions along with psychosomatic illnesses, and finally the most taxing but most salient abiltiy is to transfer planted mental fuctions like adding knowlede of something to the subjects mind or knowing, which also can work in reverse as well - meaning Velia may removing knowlege from the subjects mind. (An example of this latter ability was eradicating his childe, Lior's Insomnium.) Prime Infusion: A Fontal Ritual developed by Velia through research involving mages with extensive knowlede of Prime Arcana. Basicly it is harnessing the aetherial power emamating from stralight and through the use of arcane artifice coupled with careful positioning in a Fontal Nest ifusing harvested Prima Materia in to ritually prepared vials of extracted Vitae (ususally Velia's own or for other purposes such as Psychic Chirurgery that of a client or subject). This ritual differs little from Arcane Vitae -more widely known to Dragons- in terms that the enchanted Vitae is empowering the effects of Disciplines it fuels. Again as with Arcane Vitae- Prime infusion requires a Fontal Nest that is infused with magical enrgy, opposed to ones resonating with spiritual essence. Velia never wished to do with a ritual of her own research involving draining a live vessel utterly. She thus involved a great deal of study how to channel magical energies of a Fontal Nest to her own extracted Vitae. This took extensive knowledge in geomantic nexuses, ley line sense and manipulation, sidereal mysticism and inevitably, arcane theory and even at least the understanding of its practice. The ritual Eventually it became possiple that the vessel of Prime infused Vitae however during the ritual is extracted and conserved Vitae, rather then the blood of a live vessel that takes the mystical properties of the Fontal Nest's power. To concentrate the power of the Wyrm's Nest in to a vial of Vitae the artifact called "well" was developed. A well although are not a Hallow, was either counsciously placed over a Ley Line or the Flow of thereof are directed to them at least temporarily. The well was placed under the open sky and had a receptacle in which a vial could be placed. It had to be constructed at least partially from mereotic iron and glass (which materials supposedly held the aetherial harmonic resonance of the sidereal realm). The water in the well was made softly circulating, acting as no more than a contact subtance bewen the starlight asorbed in a prism that otherwise looked like a mere decoration and the vial in the receptacle below. Once the sufficient Aetherial Prime was solved within the Vitae in the vial the next night the it emitted a faint light (as perceived through eihter Auspex or Mage Sight) which the prism abowe seemed to project back to the sky, much like some sort of religious act, offering "magic" back to the celestial realms. Vitae infused with Prima Materia is capable, and by Velia is especially utilized to fuel Devotions, which often emulate the effects of certain mage spells to an extent she learnt of by her collaborators of the Eyes of Ain Soph. Prime infused Vitae may be used as a form of Tass by mages but understandably its Vitae content carries the effects of Vinculum with it - tied to the one whom Vitae was used in the Ritual. Note though that turning a mage in to one's ghoul causes the mage's Avatar to weakan, slowly losing its connection with the Supernal Realm, and finally losing it entirely, rendering the former mage utterly powerless. (A mage instantly and irrevocably loses his or her Avatar upon the Embrace.) Quasi-Magical abilities (Custom Devotions): 'Quasi-Arcana' and 'Spell-like abilities' - which by all intents and purposes were technically either extraordinary Devotions or Discipline powers that did accure to Velia through the consumption of Prima Materia infused Vitae created through the Prime Infusion Fontal Ritual and also by the activation of the Chastise the Beast ability from the Coil of the Beast. One point of Prima Materia Infused Vitae may have acted as one point of 'quasi-mana' to fuel 'spell-like abilities'. 'Spell-like abilities' correspond to actual mage spells studied and emulated to an extent by Velia. Technically they are refined Devotions. A vampire's soul is transfomed upon the Embrace in a supernatural way that sets it apart from that of mortal humans who can possibly enlightened by awakening to the Supernal Realm. Kindred as being undead, i.e. not alive, are categorically barred from having an Avatar in order to obtain access to the Supernal. In short this leads to the conclusion that a vampire can never become a mage. Not that he or she may not bear a spark of divinity of course (however rare that may be). Vampires on the other hand have the possibility to learn Disciplines which are supernatural means to alter the fabric of reality well aligned with their existence, though in comparison with mages' spell somewhat more static. Prime infused Vitae simply bears faint energy from Aether that can fuel known Disciplines in a way that allows a little more refinement and versatility in inventing and using custom Devotions. The 'spell-like abilities' by large were inherently covert manipulations of reality, and while they did alter reality to a certain degree they alwas fell in line with corresponding Kindred Disciples and Devotions and thus were not risking Paradox. On the other hand Velia's 'spell-like abilities' did not actually harness any given Arcanum in proper, rather stemmed from her own known Discipline powers which if in any case only inderectly derived energy from any of possibly aligning Supernal Realm. Velia's '''Prime Infusion' ''ritual confers some quasi-control over 'Quasi-Prime' abilities through Aether of course, ehile 'Quasi-Forces' are called for through the Coil of the Ascendant's predilection with light and fire, and obviously the domain of the 'Quasy-Mind' is well compatible with Auspex, but also connects with Dominate and Majesty disciplines. Insomnium is special in providig access to the Astral Realms thus making this discipleie specially relating to the Mind Arcanum as it technically makes Alucinor able to traversr others' Oneiroi and the Tremenos in a nigh-similar fashion as Mastigos mages can. (Auspex: A, Coil of the Ascendant: CoA, Dominate: D, Fontal Ritual: F, Insonmium: I, Majesty: M, Obsfuscate: O, Resilience: R) *Quasi-Forces** ::: Influence Heat (CoA+O), Influence Light (CoA+O), Influence Sound (CoA+O), Daysight (A), Read Matrices (A), Eyes of the Matrix (A), Fireproofing (CoA+R), Influence Fire (CoA+O), Invisibility to Machines (O), Kinetic Blow (A), Modulate Speech (A+O), Nullify Combustion (CoA), Telekinetic Push (A). *Quasi-Mind*** ::: Aura Perception (A), Know Virtue (A), Mask of Normality (A+O), One Mind - Two Thoughts (A), Sense Consiousness (A), Third Eye (A), Alter Aura (A), Beast Control (D), Control Waking (I+D), Eagle Eye View (A), Emotional Urging (A+M), First Impressions (A+M), Gain Skill (A), Incognito Presence (A+O), Mental Shield (A), Misperception (A+O), Pefect Mnemonic (A), Phantom Thoughts (A), Playback Vision (A), Voice from Afar (A+O), Augment the Mind (A), Aura Cloak (A), Disrupt Concentration (A), Enforce Paradigm (A+D), Eternal Now (A), Imposter (A+M+O), Induce Hoarding Instinct (A+D), Induce Sleep (I+D), Know Thyself (A), Mental Wall (A), Past Life Regression (A), Psychic Assault (A), Shroud of Disinterest (A), Sleep of the Just (I), Telepathic Alarm (A), Telepathy (A), Transfer Will (A+D), Universal Language (A). *Quasi-Prime***' ::: Analyze Enchanted Item (A), Chronicle Resonance (A), Discern Pantasm (A+O), Dispel Magic (A+D), Supernal Vision (A), Activate Enchanted Item (A+D), Counterspell Prime (A+D), Locate Node (A), Magic Shield (A+R), Paths of Power (A), Primal Flow (A), Transform Aura (A+O), Celestial Fire (A), Create Tass (F), Disguise Resonance (A+O), Dissolve Tass (F), Hallow Bond (A+F), Imbue Item (F), Imbue Mana (F+D), Instill Exclusiveness (F), Ley Lines (A), Ley Shift (A+F), Payment in Power (F), Phantasm (O), Aligning the Stars (F). 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